Donor Relations Officer

Founded in 1936, the National Wildlife Federation has grown into America's largest and most trusted grassroots conservation organization with 52 state/territorial affiliates and more than six million members and supporters, including hunters, anglers, gardeners, birders, hikers, campers, paddlers, and outdoor enthusiasts of all ages and stripes. The mission of the National Wildlife Federation is to unite all Americans to ensure wildlife thrive in our rapidly changing world. We advance this mission through programming focused on conserving wildlife, restoring habitats and waterways, expanding outdoor opportunities, connecting children with nature, advancing environmental justice, and addressing the causes and consequences of climate change.

The National Wildlife Federation believes that in order to save wildlife and ourselves, we need to ensure that everyone living in America has access to clean air and water, safe communities, easy and equitable access to nature, and protection from the ravages of climate change. These basic needs, equally necessary and urgent for all people, are foundational to bringing the conservation movement and ethos into the 21st century.

To advance our mission, we are seeking a Donor Relations Officer to join the Federation’s Development team. The Donor Relations Officer plays a crucial role in the Mid-Level Program’s success, working collaboratively to harmonize supporter engagement and create meaningful donor experiences across our Membership, Mid-Level, Major Gifts, Gift Planning, and Social Innovation programs. The position reports to the Senior Director of Donor Relations & Special Giving.

Primary responsibilities for this role include personally engaging with mid-level and prospective mid-level donors to qualify, cultivate, and steward. Tasks include, but are not limited to, corresponding directly with mid-level donors; fostering engaging experiences both virtually and in-person; identifying, building and ensuring healthy donor mobility across programs; generating stewardship content; ensuring equity and justice practices are infused throughout our engagement efforts; collaborating across teams to build synergy; building processes for pipeline management as well as retention; and developing and maintaining standardized reports and analysis.

PRINCIPLE DUTIES

The Donor Relations Officer’s role is comprised of these major areas of responsibility and focus:

Donor Relationship Management & Stewardship

• Manage a portfolio of mid-level donors by engaging and recognizing their contributions through handwritten correspondences, phone calls, and emails while managing the qualification, cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship of donors in a concentrated effort to deepen their engagement with the Federation and grow their philanthropic investments.
• Develop and manage an engagement calendar focused on creating meaningful experiences aimed at strengthening relationships and fostering deeper involvement through virtual engagement and face-to-face experiences, separate from standard stewardship activities.
• Craft communications such as thank-you letters, newsletters, and personalized updates that reflects impact of donor’s gift.
• Help implement an enhanced donor experience for new mid-level donors that offers engaging events, forums for conversation, and thoughtful donor stewardship plans.
• Collaborate with the Major Gifts and Gift Planning teams to develop consistent messaging to influence and serve as a framework for stewardship practices.
• Collaborate with key staff to ensure equity and justice practices, values, and approaches are integrated into our narratives and represented as a piece of all that we do.
• Develop and maintain standardized reports and key performance indicators on activities, prospective pipelines, and progress to inform leadership’s efforts to monitor and evaluate portfolio management, retention, strategy implementation, revenue generation, engagement targets, and resource deployment.
• Collaborate with various business units, program leads, and agency partners regularly, helping to ensure our teams are communicating and collaborating effectively.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Pipeline Management

• Ensure healthy donor mobility across our teams and lines of business, including but not limited to creating and generating segmentations within mid-level, enhancing moves management, finding opportunities for stewardship engagement, utilizing prospective dashboards, and more.
• Collaborate to develop a system for identifying prospective mid-level donors for Major Gifts and Gift Planning, utilizing research, personal interactions, and engagement insights to qualify donors for enhanced stewardship and cultivation opportunities.
• Manage a coordinated donor visit system which maximizes officer outreach with Mid-Level, Major, and Gift Planning supporters.
• Work with the Senior Director of Donor Relations to create and execute donor engagement strategies that increase retention, upgrade giving levels, and identify new prospects for growth.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Donor Engagement

• In coordination with team leads, plan and execute a series of educational webcasts and interactive round table discussions centered around donor interest overseeing logistics, production, and content development.
• Collaborate with the Senior Coordinator to draft correspondence to promote upcoming webcasts, utilizing email campaigns to maximize donor participation.
• Work in coordination with team leads to develop strategies that tailor webcasts to targeted donor segments, ensuring relevant and impactful messaging for various levels of giving.
• Provide oversight and direction to the Senior Coordinator as it relates to logistics for virtual events, including scheduling, sending invitations, coordinating speakers, and conducting technical rehearsals, as well as scripting for webcast presenters.
• Execute and coordinate with front-facing staff to conduct follow-up that offers insights and feedback, fostering the development of future events and deepening connectivity with the Federation.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Operational Support

• Maintain constituent profiles and accurately enter demographic information and contact reports relating to donor qualification, cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship, performing these and other CRM-related functions with regularity and consistency.
• In coordination with the Senior Director of Donor Relations & Special Giving, develop key performance metrics to create a shared report that is regularly executed and reviewed.
• Assist senior staff and/or volunteer leadership in the development and implementation of strategies to cultivate, engage, solicit, and steward prospective funders and existing donors.
• Consult with and assist individual giving units as needed on ad hoc tasks like scheduling and preparing presentation materials for meetings, donor mailings, and reviewing donor and corporate solicitations, acknowledgment letters, and reports.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

REQUIRED COMPETENCIES AND DESIRED SKILLS AND QUALIFICATIONS

• 5+ years of work experience within direct fundraising or nonprofit organization.
• Exceptional interpersonal skills combined with strong self-awareness, empathy, and approachability.
• Energetic and self-starting, with an ambitious mindset and the demonstrated ability to work independently and as an integral member of a team.
• Demonstrated ability for handling multiple, complex fundraising relationships simultaneously in a fast-paced environment, demonstrating strategic thinking, problem-solving, and attention to detail.
• Excellent communication and editing skills, with a proven ability to craft clear, professional written and oral correspondence, reports, and other communications.
• Solid project management skills to effectively collaborate with program staff, ensure timely progress on drafts, meet deadlines, and support team members in staying on track with reporting.
• Fosters an awareness of multiple group identities and their attendant dynamics, while seeking to deepen an understanding of the impacts of racism, anti-LGBTQ equality, sexism, and structural oppressions and their intersectionality.
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office Suite and familiarity with CRM and other fundraising software various databases and management reporting tools.

NWF Values:

Your actions are expected to reflect the staff values of the National Wildlife Federation: collaboration, mindfulness, empowerment, inclusivity, and mission focus.  Your competencies should include:

• Being motivated by values of equity and responsibility to those most marginalized;
• Consistently bringing a high level of empathy and social skills to work and interpersonal interactions;
• Being committed to deepening an environmental justice approach in policy priorities, program development and partner engagement;
• Actively seeks feedback, direction, and guidance from all team members and keeps staff informed of decisions that impact them;
• Being dedicated to advancing NWF’s internal equity transformation and compelling partners and allies to incorporate equity into their work; and
• Passion for and commitment to NWF's mission

Physical Requirements of the Job:

Remaining in a normal seated or standing position for extended periods; reaching and grasping by extending hand(s) or arm(s); dexterity to manipulate objects with fingers, for example, using a keyboard; communication skills using the spoken word; ability to see and hear within normal parameters; ability to move about the workspace. The position requires mobility, including moving materials weighing up to several pounds (such as a laptop computer or tablet).

Persons with disabilities may be able to perform the essential duties of this position with reasonable accommodation. Requests for reasonable accommodation will be evaluated on an individual basis.

Please Note:

This job description sets forth the job’s principal duties, responsibilities, and requirements; it should not be construed as an exhaustive statement, however unless they begin with the word “may,” the Essential Duties and Responsibilities described above are “essential functions” of the job, as defined by the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Travel Requirements: 

Occasional overnight travel, approximately 8-10 nights per year on average.

Location and Work Mode: 

This position will have full time remote capabilities with the expectation of occasional visits to our headquarters in Reston, Virginia. The National Wildlife Federation is committed to a flexible and empowered work environment with an authentic community of care for all staff. In this position, the employee may work in the office, in a hybrid manner, or fully remote, to be decided jointly with their supervisor in the final stages of the interview process. For more information on Work Modes, please review the benefits section of our careers page. For more information on Work Modes, please review the benefits section of our careers page: https://www.nwf.org/About-Us/Careers 

Compensation and Benefits:

The salary range for this position is $72,000 - $80,000, commensurate with experience.

We are proud of our designation by Mogul as a Top 100 Workplace with the Best Benefits, and by Forbes as one of America’s best small employers!  We value work-life balance and a family-friendly atmosphere with flexible scheduling.  We want you to be able to integrate work and personal life with attention to your self-care, so that your work schedule is not depleting.  We offer benefits so you feel restored and fueled through the day and week.

We offer these supports to help manage your mental, emotional, and physical health: 

• Paid time off: Vacation that starts off at three weeks accrual, unlimited wellbeing (this time can be used for physical, spiritual, emotional, cultural, religious or financial wellbeing for yourself, a partner, or family member – including pets), and 10 holidays.
• We close down for a paid winter break between December 25 to January 1 to recognize end of-year stress, and time for reflection, rejuvenation, and spending time with family.
• Up to 16 weeks of fully paid Family and Medical Leave
• Low-cost health, dental, and vision insurance options – all outpatient mental health is covered at in-network rates
• Therapist available at no cost
• Pet insurance and discount perk program
• Annual wellbeing allowance

In addition to your salary, we offer the following supports to your personal finances:

• Retirement plan with immediate match and vesting
• Annual year end retirement contribution
• Tuition Reimbursement
• Adoption and Surrogacy assistance
• Pet adoption stipend
• Student Loan management

Applicants are invited to learn more about National Wildlife Federation’s benefits package at https://www.nwf.org/About-Us/Careers.

Application:

Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. Candidates should submit a cover letter and resume.

We strive to increase diversity, equity, inclusion and justice (DEIJ) in all elements of our work and with our partners to support the interdependent needs of wildlife and people in a rapidly changing world. We recruit, employ, train compensate, and promote regardless of race, religion, creed, national origin, ancestry, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, gender identity (including gender nonconformity and status as a transgender individual), age, physical or mental disability, citizenship, genetic information, past, current, or prospective service in the uniformed services, or any other characteristic protected under applicable federal, state, or local law. We are proud to be an equal opportunity employer. Applicants are invited to learn more about National Wildlife Federation’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion at nwf.org/equity.

We recognize that people come with a wealth of knowledge and talent beyond just the technical requirements of a job. Your experience, which may include paid and unpaid work, including volunteer work, helps build the competencies and knowledge that translates to our openings. Whether you’re new to the field, returning to work after a gap in your employment, or are taking the next step in your career path, if you believe you could excel in this role we encourage you to apply! Diversity of experience and skills combined with passion is a key to innovation and a culture of excellence. To be eligible for this role you must be a U.S. citizen or have valid work authorization to work in the U.S

Please let us know if you require accommodations during the application or interview process by reaching us at hrhelp@nwf.org  or 703-438-6244.

If selected for this position, a background check will be conducted.